The CRS is a Congressional "think tank" with a staff of around 700. Reports are commissioned by members of Congress on topics relevant to current political events. Despite CRS costs to the tax payer of over $100M a year, its electronic archives are, as a matter of policy, not made available to the public.

Individual members of Congress will release specific CRS reports if they believe it to assist them politically, but CRS archives as a whole are firewalled from public access.

This report was obtained by Wikileaks staff from CRS computers accessible only from Congressional offices.

The prospects for the future of multilateral development bank assistance in China are uncertain. In a few years, the World Bank will have to cut its level of International Bank for Reconstruction and Development lending or waive its rule against lending more than 10 percent of its funds to one country. If U.S. influence in the World Bank diminishes, Japan and some other countries may want to revisit the question of terminating International Development Association (IDA) assistance to China. Likewise, it is not evident what will replace IDA as a source of credit for social programs and non-commercial agricultural development. The Chinese government has not shown that it is willing to borrow market-rate money to fund these activities.